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Telecommunications leaders are criticizing the Competition Bureau after it announced that it will study broadband Internet services provided to Canadians rather than 5G wireless.

5G wireless is the future and only about 24 months away from becoming widely available, according to Globalive Capital Chairperson Anthony Lacavera. For this reason, the Competition Bureau’s focus on current fixed line broadband is misguided, says Mr. Lacavera.

“The Competition Bureau must do a similar analysis and report on wireless,” he says.

Graham Fletcher, founder and owner of the Internet Centre in Edmonton, also said that “it does not make sense to limit the scope of the exercise to landline broadband internet” offered by traditional Internet Service Providers such as Bell, Rogers, Telus and Shaw.

The Competition Bureau announced last week that it will study ways to improve competition in the broadband wireline market, given that 87% of Canada’s internet subscriptions are with a few traditional phone or cable companies.

But even though most of them are integrating their fibre optics and fifth-generation wireless networks to serve households, businesses and whole cities, the Competition Bureau is only planning to look at the wireline side of the broadband business and leave wireless to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), which has yet to announce when it will perform a study of its own.

Telecommunications executives have said neglecting to study 5G wireless, which is where the online industry is moving in a hurry, is short sighted.